As I understand it, evidence points to a time when some of my ancestors used all four of their limbs to walk and move generally. I have read repeatedly that going about on just two legs enabled animals to develop hands. You might think that having hands is nice and all, but what are we going to do with them?
The answers are surprisingly complicated. Roughly, the answer is "everything." I said to a physical therapist that I had read that back and spine problems might be less for humans if we gave up walking on two legs and returned using all our four limbs for walking but he said he didn't want to give up walking on two legs ("bipedalism"). My hearing has gotten poor and I often can't tell what someone said. People my age often find that their eyesight isn't as good as it was. People my age have memory problems, too. I try to keep pen and paper handy to write a note about something I want to remember. Those thoughts bring me to hands, using them to make notes.
Once I start thinking about hands and paying some attention to them, I realize how much I can do with them. I do use them to make the letters in this blog post. I do use them for carrying things. I do use them to pour and cut and use cutlery. I am impressed with the way my fingers and my brain cooperate in picking up and carrying several objects at once, without thinking about how to do that. It almost seems that my hands do important things on their own. There is a book "The Hand" by Frank Wilson.
